Thursday, September 5, 2019, Liverpool, England
Iconic Liverpool
Hometown of 56 musical artists who have had #1 singles, more than any other city, Liverpool is celebrated as the "World Capital of Pop." Most notably, the Beatles hailed from this port city. But it is more than music that has put Liverpool on England's cultural map. Its storied waterfront is part of the city's Maritime Mercantile UNESCO World Heritage Site and the setting for Pier Head, a spectacular trio of palatial buildings known as the "Three Graces." The city's religions are embodied in the cone-shaped Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral and the Liverpool Cathedral, one of the largest church buildings in the world. In all, more that 2,500 buildings are protected for their historic, architectural, and cultural significance.
On our city by city bus excursion today we learned about the home port of the RMS Titanic—one of history’s
most famous ships. We saw and heard about the iconic Royal Liver and Cunard buildings, Albion House—once
headquarters to White Star, the company that owned the Titanic—the Liverpool
Philharmonic Hall and the rejuvenated Albert Dock. We stopped at Liverpool Cathedral, the largest Anglican cathedral in Britain and the
fifth largest in the world. We witnessed its impressive Gothic arches, the highest
in Europe, and majestic organ. We also stopped to see the Liverpool
Metropolitan Cathedral—a complete architectural contrast, with its striking
style and multicolored glass lantern tower—and visited famous sites associated
with the Beatles’ formative years, which inspired their songwriting in the
cultural city they called home.
Major shipping offices. Forty percent of Great Britain's imports and exports go through Liverpool.
The are two of these birds atop this building, each facing in opposite directions: The one facing the sea is female watching for her man to come home the other is male, looking for the closest pub!
The square upper portion of the left building is a hiding a large vent to exhaust fumes from a tunnel that goes under the harbor; there is a similar building on the other side of the harbor. Depending on the direction of the wind determines which way the air is blown/exhausted from the tunnel.
Liverpool Philharmonic Hall is a concert hall in Hope Street, in Liverpool, England. It is the home of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Society and is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade II listed building. It is not the original concert hall on the present site; its predecessor was destroyed by fire in 1933 and the present hall was opened in 1939.
The Liverpool Philharmonic Society was founded in 1840 but initially did not have a permanent concert hall. In 1844 the Liverpool architect John Cunningham was appointed to prepare plans for a hall. The initial requirement was for a "concert room" holding an audience of 1,500 which would cost at least £4,000 (equivalent to £393,000 in 2018). Later that year the requirement was increased to a "new concert hall" to accommodate an audience of 2,100 and an orchestra of 250, plus "refreshment and retiring rooms". Subscribers were invited to both buy shares and to purchase seats along the sides of the hall. The foundation stone was laid in 1846 and plans were made for Mendelssohn to write a cantata to be played in his presence at the opening of the hall. Mendelssohn did not live long enough to write the work.
The hall cost £30,000 (equivalent to £3.06 million in 2018) and was opened on 27 August 1849 accompanied by a week long festival. A correspondent for The Times reported that it was "one of the finest and best adapted to music that I ever entered".
The backside of the philharmonic hall has the criminal justice area with the jail in the walkout basement.
This green space is in front of the criminal justice building.
Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King Liverpool.
The cathedral is the seat of the Archbishop of Liverpool. Many important events have taken place since the opening of the Cathedral. They are a visit of the Queen in 1977, the National Pastoral Congress in 1980, and the launch of the Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland in 1990.
Wall tapestries.
The seats that are 360 degrees around the center alter can hold 2,300 people.
Cathedral exterior.
Model of cathedral built before construction.
Stain glass changes colors as you rotate around the perimeter of the sanctuary.
Suitcases depicting possessions left behind as starving people left the land in mid-1800s.
Liverpool Cathedral is the Church of England Cathedral of the Diocese of Liverpool, built on St James's Mount in Liverpool and is the seat of the Bishop of Liverpool. It may be referred to as the Cathedral Church of Christ in Liverpool (as recorded in the Document of Consecration) or the Cathedral Church of the Risen Christ, Liverpool, being dedicated to Christ 'in especial remembrance of his most glorious Resurrection'. Liverpool Cathedral is the largest cathedral and religious building in Britain.
Look like Washington monument in DC.
Pelican above the alter. Female pelicans apparently, if food for their young is scarce, will cut themselves and feed their own blood so young can survive. This is said to be true about all females in the animal kingdom.
The center hole is 331 feet above the cathedral floor; all 14 bells were lifted through this hole to mount them in the belfry.
Diane noticed the quilt patterns on a section in the floor.
She wanted the ladies in her COR quilt group to be sure to see these!
The young (20s) designer/architect of the cathedral also designed the British "telephone box."
Penny Lane is a street in the city of Liverpool in the north of England. The name also applies to the area surrounding the thoroughfare. The street is off the A562 road. During the twentieth century, it was the location for one of the main bus termini in Liverpool.
The street gained international fame in 1967 when the English rock group the Beatles released their song "Penny Lane," written in tribute to the band members' upbringing in Liverpool. Penny Lane was named after James Penny, an eighteenth-century slave trader. As with many of the era's industrialists, and Liverpool itself, Penny became wealthy through the international slave trade, for which the port city served as an important stopover between the African continent and America.
After the city's expansion, Penny Lane was the location for a significant bus terminus for several routes, and buses with "Penny Lane" displayed were common throughout Liverpool. The name Penny is also used for the area that surrounds its junction with Smithdown Road, Smithdown Place (where the terminus was located) and Allerton Road, including a busy shopping area. It was the terminus for the number 46 and 99 bus routes to Walton, Old Swan and the city centre. At the other end from its junction on Smithdown Road, the street leads down to the University of Liverpool's student halls of residence, near Sefton Park.
The street and the bus depot became a place of international interest as a result of the Beatles' song "Penny Lane." Released in February 1967, the song was a number 1 hit in many charts around the world. The fireman and fire engine referred to in the lyrics are the fire station at Mather Avenue, which is close to Penny Lane. The terminus at Penny Lane included a purpose-built bus shelter, with a waiting room and toilets. The shelter is located on its own island, which is "the shelter in the middle of a roundabout" referred to in the song.
Toward the end of the 1970s, business-es in Penny Lane included Penny Lane Records and a wine bar known as Har-per's Bizarre, now called Penny Lane Wine Bar. The latter was formerly a doctors' surgery, previously Drs Walton, Endbinder, and Partners; the practice moved to Smithdown Place in the 1980s. Following privatization, the Merseyside Passenger Transport Executive bus depot, slightly up the hill past Bioletti's barbershop, was demolished and replaced with a shopping precinct complete with a supermarket and a public house. In the 1980s, the bus shelter was bought privately and converted to the Sergeant Pepper's Bistro. It subsequently closed and remained out of commission until 2015, when it underwent refurbishment with the aim of reopening as a restaurant, although it was still not open as of October 2016.
The street has long been sought out by Beatles fans touring Liverpool. In the past, street signs saying "Penny Lane" were constant targets of tourist theft and had to be continually replaced. City officials gave up and simply began painting the street name on the sides of buildings. This practice was stopped in 2007 and more theft-resistant "Penny Lane" street signs have since been installed, although some are still stolen. The Penny Lane area has acquired a level of trendiness and desirability. The "alternative" businesses (wholefood outlets, charity shops), the now expanded array of cafes, bars, bistros and takeaway food emporiums, as well as traditional businesses (WHSmith and Clarke's cake shop), make the neighborhood the most sought-after among Liverpool's large student population.
In July 2006, a Liverpool counselor proposed renaming certain streets because their names were linked to the slave trade. One such street was Penny Lane, given James Penny's past and his strong opposition to abolitionism. Ultimately, city officials decided to forgo the name change and entirely re-evaluate renaming.
Statues of the Beatles along dock at Liverpool.
This and the next two pictures are shops in the Penny Lane song.
Street signed alleged to have been signed by Paul McCarthy.
Office building of White Star Line, the owner/operator of Steamship Titanic.
RMS Titanic was the largest ship afloat at the time she entered service and was the second of three Olympic-class ocean liners operated by the White Star Line. She was built by the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast.
Tonight we will sail to Glasgow instead of Holyhead; this change of itinerary is due to strong, northerly winds forecast on the Irish Sea. We will dock at Greenokh; it will be another 45-minute bus ride up channel to Glasgow.
Comments
Post a Comment